How can corporate employees’ participation in Social Media be dealt with and managed in a way that liberates them — without putting the company at risk?

While I most often write about Social Media for Marketing, this question of Social Media use within the Corporation is ultimately a much bigger issue.

I’ve seen (and helped develop) several Social Media Usage Policies. Meanwhile, folks like Dave Fleet have done an outstanding job of covering Social Media Policies at a philosophical level.

But, you’re busy. You want the work done for you, eh? I get it.

One of our new clients (an iconic brand that I can’t wait to tell you about!) recently worked on a new Social Media Policy which we helped to refine and humanize. It represents one of the best examples I’ve seen, and offers the added benefit of having been vetted by top corporate lawyers.

Copy & paste as you see fit, for your own company or clients: there may be some stuff that doesn’t fly within your own organization, but, this document is worth running up the flagpole with your company’s legal eagles, with the C-suite execs, etc.

As always you are encouraged to use this content with or without attribution to me or SHIFT. Make it your own.

Thanks for sharing the pdf.It is valuable.While Social media can really be beneficial for companies to get in touch with the huge online crowd and to establish a brand image there, this is to be practiced with caution.Even a slightly offensive comment somewhere can raise a question to companies reputation.Companies should make sure to allow only experienced employees to handle all these stuff because they know better about the company and knows what to share and what not.Certainly, not a thing to be practiced by bottom level employees.

Hi Todd,
Have borrowed from multiple sources, including your guidelines, to create our social media policy which will be launched next week. Questions keep popping up: this seems to be an area where exceptions are the rule. How have you addressed employees posting pictures of colleagues who are not their Friends on Facebook? Thinking that a no-tagging policy is the answer OR tagging by permission only. In addition employees should oblige to taking down any materials upon request of a colleague who’s had unwanted photos posted. Basically, we want to ensure employees’ privacy is not violated.

Whether brief or detailed, employees definitely need to know their organization’s rules of the road. They’re going to engage in social media anyway; it’s up to employers to guide and shape that engagement appropriately.

I have worked with many companies who think they are using Social Media with their “external” customers only to find out that they also have “internal” customers… employees. These policies offer a good foundation for what can be done and what cannot.